


nothing feels better than blood on blood

by janie_tangerine



Series: in the land of Nod [2]
Category: Blade Runner (Movies)
Genre: (SORT OF I GUESS??? I DECIDED IT'S LIKE THAT), Alternate Canon, Androids, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Families of Choice, Fix-It, Gen, Identity Issues, Names, Sibling Bonding, Spoilers, Wishful Thinking, ana also deserves better, deckard for accidental father of the year tbh, give k a hug 2k17, officer k deserves better
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-14
Updated: 2017-11-14
Packaged: 2019-02-02 14:18:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12728208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janie_tangerine/pseuds/janie_tangerine
Summary: Ana holds out a hand.“So,” she says, “how about we introduce ourselves properly before doing anything else? I think it’s long overdue.”He tentatively extends a hand, then thinks back on it and takes hers in both of his, and she can’t help noticing that his skin really doesn’t feel any different from her father’s or anyone else’s that she remembers touching.More human than human.Not a joke, after all.





	nothing feels better than blood on blood

**Author's Note:**

> ... so, there was apparently more to this damned thing than what I had. Also, I re-watched the movie a week or so ago and MY FEELINGS ARE STILL THERE AND I NEED TO EXORCISE THEM also K still deserved better and *everyone* deserved better at least in his camp so here we go, have a sequel, with less literary infodump and more pseudo-adopted-siblings fluff because I say so. There's at least another story where this comes from when I find the time for it because this month has been busy af and the next will be too but I'm doing it at some point is2g.
> 
> Meanwhile, I'll just leave this here. The title is from Bruce Springsteen, the (now series!) title is always from _East of Eden_ (or the Genesis if you so prefer but I was trying to keep up with the theme), Blade Runner  & its characters belong to its various owners, nothing is mine except the wishful thinking and I'm sauntering vaguely downwards again. <3

As the man who introduced himself as _Officer KD6-3.7_ not long ago (but it feels a lot longer than the mere days that have passed) walks inside the room for the second time this month, Ana can’t help thinking that even if he does look entirely worse off physically than he did the first time, there’s _something_ to his eyes that has changed for the better. He’s holding himself slightly less stiff, even if he has a hand on his side and he’s obviously still recovering from his injuries, but – he does look as if someone’s lifted a weight from his shoulders.

She’s glad to see it – it was too heavy, the last time they saw each other.

She had thought, after he left, _why didn’t I tell him that I knew it was a real memory because it was mine_?

Maybe it was because she had _never_ purposefully planted it. Never mind that it’s illegal, _why_ would she have saddled anyone else with it? She had honestly been shocked to see it so vivid and neat, but inside _someone else’s_ mind. And she has pondered the question since. She doesn’t know if the most likely solution she reached to explain it is true or not, but she figures it doesn’t matter.

“Officer,” she greets him, not sure of _how_ she should address him. Deckard

(no, _her father_ , her _real_ one, and hadn’t _that_ come as a surprise? But a welcomed one)

had told her of what plans he had when it concerned former Officer KD6-3.7, but he didn’t tell her whether he actually went through with most of them before he left to _get a few things ready and let them talk_. She’s actually grateful he didn’t. She’d rather find out from – from _him_ , all things considered.

“Not anymore, I fear,” he replies, sort of awkwardly, but he’s also… smiling ever so slightly. As if he’s trying it out and he never had much occasion to do such a thing until now.

“I imagined,” she says. “Then again, I doubt you will miss the job, won’t you?”

“No,” he agrees, “I really won’t. Doctor –”

“Please,” she says, moving towards the button that opens the glass door to the outside, but not touching it – not yet –, “it’s Ana. And what about _you_? I was told it might not be your serial number anymore.”

“Uh, it seems like – it’s not.”

“So, Deckard told you?”

“Did you know?”

She smiles. “I did,” she agrees. “He’s come quite a few times – he does want to make up for lost time. He did tell me. I just didn’t know if he asked you yet. But it seems like you accepted, didn’t you?”

“Yes. It’s just – I need to get adjusted to it, I guess. And –”

He shakes his head, and takes the infamous wooden horse from his pocket. “I know what Deckard said, but if you want it back –”

“I don’t,” she replies at once. Even if she _did_ , it would be beyond cruel to ask back for it, not when it hasn’t meant much to her for a long time and when it’s meant _everything_ to him. “I think I should tell you a story, should you care to hear it.”

“Of course I would.”

She nods. “I left that orphanage not long after hiding that horse,” she says. “I was… bought on the spot. And I had a few good years, before my parents left for the off-world colonies and I was diagnosed with – my illness. Supposed illness.”

“ _Supposed_?”

“After you came, I wondered, _why_ did you have that memory?”

“You – you didn’t –”

“No,” she shakes her head. “It was _my_ memory. I did tell you that there’s something of the artist in every work of art, true, but _something_. Not _all_ of it. I hadn’t done it. But I think my memories must have been scanned during the medical exams I had to go through. I thought about it, and the only explanation was that someone had taken that memory from me _then_ and then – implanted it in you. I suppose because you were supposed to be the decoy.”

Ana sees him flinch. Of course he would. Her fingers are aching to _move_ , but –

Not just yet.

“Anyway, if _that_ happened and I did not know, _what else_ might have happened that I did not know about?”

“That’s – a fair doubt.”

“I called one of the doctors in the facility and asked for some thorough tests. They came back the day after… my father visited me.”

“What – what do they say?” He looks apprehensive, as if he’s honestly worried of what might happen to her now.

“They said,” she says, her voice slightly trembling, “that there’s nothing wrong with me.”

He stops fiddling with the horse in his hands and stares right up at her. “ _Nothing_?”

“No,” she confirms. “Nothing. Which means that someone arranged so that I would spend my life behind a glass, and now I guess even know who.” She wants to laugh at that. “Believe me, I hadn’t known I was hiding just to be revealed as the head of some revolution when I didn’t even know I was – half-replicant until two weeks ago.”

He _does_ laugh at that, bitterly, then stops himself. “Sorry about that, but – it just seemed – never mind.”

“Please, do say it.”

“It’s – maybe ironic, that they wanted me to kill him. When I thought –”

“That he was _your_ father? Well, seems like they disregarded your very justified feelings same as they disregarded my opinion,” she agrees, because it’s true, and she was _angry_ when she found out. She understands acting for the greater good, or she has tried to in this circumstance, but the first reaction she had upon learning she was entirely healthy all along, had been feeling sick in the stomach. And now she feels the same looking at him, truth to be told – she can see that his grip around the horse he’s keeping in his pocket must be painful by now, and she remembers how he reacted when she told him that memory was real, and she can only imagine how horrible it must feel to think that you’re more than a soulless programmed machine just to be told that _no_ , you were wrong and you have been lied to all this time.

And that when – she knows that replicants are seen as replaceable objects by about anyone who uses them.

Ana would like to understand the reasoning behind this all, but she doesn’t think she ever will understand how can you do _that_ to your own kind when your target is being seen as _more_ than a replaceable object, but she supposes this is not the day she’ll find that answer. Never mind that she’s half one herself, isn’t she?

Instead, she presses the button and the glass door slides open, bringing them finally face to face. They’re close enough to touch now, and he’s put the horse back in his coat’s pocket – good.

She holds out a hand.

“So,” she says, “how about we introduce ourselves properly before doing anything else? I think it’s long overdue.”

He tentatively extends a hand, then thinks back on it and takes hers in both of his, and she can’t help noticing that his skin really doesn’t feel any different from her father’s or anyone else’s that she remembers touching.

More human than human.

 _Not a joke, after all_.

She shakes the hand that’s holding hers. “That’d be _Ana_. No _Doctor Stelline_ or anything so ridiculously formal. I’m not accepting that from someone who has _my_ memories.”

“Fair,” he admits, his voice sounding almost chocked. “Uh, it’s definitely not _Officer_ anymore. And – seems like – it’s Roy now.”

“That’s definitely nicer than _K_ ,” she agrees. He sounds awed that he’s actually using it, and she wonders, _how horrible must it be to live your life without even a proper name to you_? “Well then, while it’s something I really didn’t have responsibilities in… I still owe you an apology.”

“ _What_? You don’t owe me a thing. Please –”

“No, I do. You never asked to _be a decoy for me_ , whoever put _my_ memories in your head did it knowing you most likely would die for it some day and they still sent you out to – to kill your, I guess _our_ , own kind without you having a say in it and knowing that you might suffer for it. As you did. Please, do not tell me you didn’t, I could see it from how you reacted when I told you those memories were real.”

“I didn’t even know I _could_ suffer like that,” he admits.

“ _And_ , I cannot imagine how it must feel to assume something of that magnitude about yourself and then have it wrenched away, but it cannot have felt good. Given that the same people behind it thought it fitting to… hide me here without telling me a thing, I am not surprised. So, I’m awfully sorry it happened to you, and – I’m beyond grateful you chose to ignore them and – well. Do what you did.”

“I – your apologies weren’t really necessary, I knew, but – I’ll accept them, if it’s important to you.”

She laughs, just a bit. “You know, people do apologize to each other. You really should stop thinking you’re _less_ than people.”

“Might be hard if that’s what you thought your entire life,” he whispers, not quite looking at her, and she kind of wants to rage on his behalf because that’s no way to treat a living being, be it replicant or not

( _she wishes she could have given him nice memories like she did for the others, and instead she’s done all the contrary, hasn’t she?_ )

and she knows, deep in her heart, that she doesn’t want to be the face of people who think their own lives are expendable if hers it at stake.

Still –

Since she knew for sure, she’s thought, _so what if he has my memories, that’d mean he would understand me better, wouldn’t it_ , and – she’s always led such a lonely life. The orphanage first, being an only child later, her _parents_ (or who she thought they were) disappearing, an entire life behind a damned glass –

“Roy,” she says, her hand going to his arm. It takes him a moment to actually respond to it, but he looks so _beyond_ glad that she called him like that that she thinks her heart grows a few sizes. “I – I usually – I told you before. You – I should say _we_ , but never mind – don’t lead good lives. That’s why I try to create… nice memories I never got to experience. I’m sorry that you didn’t get any of them. And don’t feed me any lines about the _best_ ones being mine, because _that_ memory was horrible and I’d know it, it was _mine_. I – I think I should like to make up for it, if you’re amenable. Never mind that I don’t have many nice ones myself.”

She feels him going stiff for a moment, as if such a proposal was not what he had been thinking he’d get from this conversation, but if she looks at his eyes she can see that he’s _yearning_ to say yes, and – how, _how_ , she thinks, do you consider anyone who’d react like this to such a _human_ prospect is nothing more than a machine?

“I – I could say the same,” he says, tentatively, and she can hear that what he really means, is _I have almost none, when it comes to good things_. “And what were you thinking of?”

She shrugs. Their hands are still touching and he hasn’t let her go even if she’s sure he knows that such prolonged contact is usually frowned upon, so he’s probably not even thinking about it.

She doubts he ever got much of a chance to form _good_ memories, when it came to touching people. Her father told her about an AI, but AIs don’t _touch_ people, do they?

She shrugs and tells him the most obvious thing, a memory she has created in a thousand different variations but never quite experienced for herself.

“I imagine no one ever threw you a birthday party, have they?”

“The LAPD doesn’t really provide that service for its officers, no.”

“I don’t think I ever had a proper one either. There were a few gifts those years with my adoptive parents, but _parties_? Not really.”

“And your proposal would be?”

It’s almost sad that he doesn’t get there at once. Or maybe it _is_ , but then again she remembers that until a month ago he really wasn’t even supposed to think for himself, never mind breaking programming – how would he get there at once?

“October sixth could be _our_ birthday,” she proposes, tentatively. “How long is it until then, anyway? Three months? Sharing it, that would be nice.” Honest, the prospect is alluring – it’s a _date_ , nothing to her, a date she’s spent most of her life working or studying or imagining other people blowing out nonexistent candles and recording them and thinking, _it will never be me_. Not that candles would be anywhere to be blown, she fears, but it’s the _concept_ of it, and she wants to tell him, _and why wouldn’t I want to share it with someone who was willing to die to give me back my real family_ , and she’s about to, but she doesn’t when she looks up at him and sees that his eyes are wet, in the way eyes usually are when someone’s happy rather than sad.

Maybe she doesn’t need to say anything at all.

She thinks of the books she read

( _her,_ their _father, says_ he _likes to read as well – she should ask what he likes_ )

where siblings would help each other out or be there for each other or jab at each other without meaning it, thinks of how many times she had thought, _I wish I had one, too,_ and she wonders how the people who kept her hidden for this long would have approached her to explain why, when the moment came.

Would they have told her that she could save the entirety of her kind and that it somehow made them all somehow related? But how, when from what she’s heard they all consider her _different_?

And this, when she hadn’t even known until Rick Deckard walked through that door, and hadn’t even suspected until the man in front of her came through the door as well, and showed her _her own memories_ that he was thinking upon as if they were his and only his?

“It – it would be more than nice,” he finally says, breaking her train of thought. “If that’s what you want.”

“Is it what _you_ want?”

He laughs, tentatively. “There’s _nothing_ I would want more. But – are you sure?”

“I asked, didn’t I? And if you’re wondering why _you_ , well… why anyone else? We have something in common, whether we chose it or not. I – I never even suspected any of this, and I’d rather have someone who _went against orders_ for me when they barely even knew me than someone who assumes things of me when they _don’t_ and who’d have sacrificed my father if it meant keeping me here. I see why they would, I understand, but – that’s not what _you_ did. And that’s – do you even know?”

“Do I know what?”

“Your – your model. The programming is very strict. You shouldn’t even be able to consider going against direct orders. I earned quite a lot from memories sold for your brand specifically, because _yours_ needed more crutches to handle what was in store for you at most points. You’re going against _all_ programming, and I doubt it’s just it being faulty. I think it’s mostly _you_.”

“Maybe that’s because there’s more than something of you in me,” he says. “You know, the – the medic who was there at your birth. That’s what started all this. I had to retire him.”

“What did he say?”

“That you were a miracle. Maybe having some of _that_ can’t have hurt.”

“No,” she shakes her head. She already doesn’t know what to do with the new information about where she really comes from, the last thing she needs or wants is to be singled as goddamned _miracle_ who is supposed to change the sorts of an entire species. “No, I think that if any of us here has pulled a miracle that’d be you, not me. But regardless, I’ve been alone most of my life. If I have to be a _miracle_ , I’d appreciate not being on my own in doing that.”

His grip on her hand is bordering on painful by now as he looks at her and says that all right, _yes_ , he’d be more than glad to keep her company, and she wonders, _why is it_ , and then – Deckard did tell her that he’s only ever had that AI, and she knows that he’s bunked with her father for all this time but whenever he came to visit Deckard _would_ sigh and say that he wasn’t sure of how far he was supposed to go with not-Joe, or of what would the kid even _want_ because he wouldn’t _say_.

She’s sent into the world a not small amount of memories in which someone’s older sibling would hold them close, not ever knowing which of the two she’d have liked to be.

Maybe –

She slips her hand from in between his, slow, and for a moment his face turns worried, as if he’s thinking that he overstepped his boundaries, but then she puts her arms around his shoulders and tugs him slightly closer.

For a moment, it’s kind of obvious that he hadn’t expected it nor knows how to react, but then his arms go very tentatively around her waist, one hand at the small of her back and one in between her shoulder blades. He’s taller, and she can feel how much stronger than her he exactly is from the strength of his fingers’ grip, and of course he would, he was _made_ to handle pain and dish it out, but right now he’s not dishing it. Right now –

When she had the results of her tests, the first thing she did the next time her father came to visit was opening the door.

He had walked through and held her close without blinking, and a strength you wouldn’t have imagined he had in him just by looking, but appearances deceive.

 _Right now_ , there isn’t the same strength in the gesture, not _quite_ , as if he’s not going to go for it fully when he’s barely even done this before if ever, but he also doesn’t seem to want to let go at any point soon.

Which is entirely fine by Ana – hell, she _had_ missed this. Conjuring people is not the same as having them right where you are.

Her fingers touch upon a small scar on the back of his neck and he shudders slightly.

“What’s that?”

“They took off my tracker before they sent me after Deckard,” he replies, sounding _tired_ and of course he would, and _they_ –

Oh. The people who are just waiting for her to lead the replicant revolution, or whatever it is they hope for her to do.

She covers the scar with her palm and tugs him a bit closer, his forehead touches her shoulder and she doesn’t know how much time they have _for now_ , but until she _has_ to move, well… she won’t.

And neither will he, she thinks.

\--

“I see that went well.”

They both move apart instantly the moment they hear it, even if they probably didn’t have to, not when it came from her

( _their_?)

father, who’s just come back with a bag slung over his shoulder.

“Here,” he says, throwing it Ana’s way – she catches it. “If you’re sure about it, Salinas should be safe for another few days.”

“If _she_ ’s sure about what?”

“About coming with you,” Ana says quietly as she opens the bag. There are clothes inside it, of course. Clothes that aren’t scrubs. “And yes, I am. I’m not being the prop for anyone if they don’t ask me first. Do we have a plan beyond that, though?”

“I’ve planned for a long fucking time.” Deckard almost sounds smug – she thinks he looks a good ten years younger than he had when he walked into her lab first. “Go get changed.”

She nods and heads for the bathroom she had in her office, beyond that glass wall for one last time. The clothes are definitely cut for a man but they’re heavy and warm and they’re not _scrubs_. She puts them on carefully, throwing on her shoulders a coat for the first time in years – it’s a nice coat, she thinks. A lovely shade of green, all synthetic wool, the only piece of clothing in that bag that looked even remotely cut for a woman, but she does like how it fits on her, she thinks.

She puts her camera in the bag, then a tablet with all her research and her books, then a few files that she wouldn’t want anyone else to find, then ponders it for a moment –

No, better to be thorough. She deletes all the data she had on her system, then pulls on the gloves that were at the bottom of the bag, then walks past the glass.

“That’s all?” Her father asks.

“There’s nothing else I can’t replace,” she replies, shrugging. There really isn’t, and she’s not too keen on bringing with anything that’d remind her that she spent most of her life behind a glass when she didn’t _have_ to. “So the plan is – going to Salinas?”

Deckard nods as he shakes his head and goes where the man she’s already thinking of as her brother is standing, just in time because he was about to topple over.

“Are you ever going to _stop_ pretending you’re fine if you’re not?” Deckard huffs. It’s obvious that the wound still hasn’t healed yet, which is weird given that replicants should heal faster, but Ana figures that maybe it really was _that_ bad.

“I –”

“Never mind, just hang on. Anyway, the plan is going to Salinas, give him another couple of days to heal up, going to Vegas so I can take the dog back and – well, meanwhile, I’ve got to try and talk to a friend, I think.”

“A _friend_?” Roy groans, now leaning on Deckard as they head towards the exit.

“Well, I don’t know, I haven’t talked to him in a long time but he owes me a favor or a thousand, and he doesn’t like Freysa much more than _you_ do, kid.”

“Who said –”

“You hate her guts and you have every goddamned reason to, don’t try to lie about _that_. Or about how you’re feeling _well_. Other than that, you can lie about whatever pleases you, but never mind. I guess neither of you is going to call shotgun?”

“… _what_?” Ana asks.

“What I thought,” Deckard says. “Never mind, he shouldn’t be standing anyway. So, we going?”

Ana nods and follows the two of them out of the door, and for a moment she almost weeps as she breathes fresh air for the first time since she was _eight_ , and who cares if it’s cold and if there’s snow melting under her boots. She breathes in once, twice, then heads towards the car parked outside and puts her bag in the trunk while Deckard opens the back door and hauls his charge inside.

“You can get in the front or share with him,” her father says as he slams the door closed. “What’ll be?”

Ana considers it.

“The back is fine,” she says, “but next time… I call shotgun?”

“Fair,” Deckard replies, sounding entirely more pleased about it than when he first asked the question. “Then do get in. I’m sure he’ll be glad to show you around while I go call that favor.”

“Okay,” she agrees, feeling like she could cry for all the right reasons, and then she gets into the backseat from the opposite side as Deckard takes the wheel.

The back is admittedly kind of cramped, mostly because there’s someone else already halfway sprawled on three-quarters of the seat – and that’s how she ends up with former officer’s – no, _Roy_ ’s – side pressing up against her as he lifts himself up to a sitting position with a groan.

“Sorry,” he says, “I guess it’s still not healed completely.”

“That,” her father huffs, “is because _you didn’t say as soon as you should have_.”

Ana wants to ask, _shouldn’t they have built you better than that_ , but then –

“And don’t say that I should have just _glued_ it back up,” Deckard goes on. “That shit’s cheap.”

“That was the point, though.”

Ana doesn’t say, _how could you build the likes of you with that much care just to toss your kind away when it’s_ expensive _to repair you_.

It’s probably not a really good idea.

“Well,” Deckard says, turning the engine on and lifting the car from the ground, “I don’t do cheap. Let’s go back and then I can worry about how to get the dog.” Ana can barely hear the last part, he’s obviously talking to himself more than to them.

She sits up straighter against the backseat, and then she moves her arm so that it’s not in between them, hanging uncomfortably.

For a moment she lets it hover in the air – damn, she hasn’t had contact with _anyone_ in years, she doesn’t _know_ what she’s supposed to do here – but then she tentatively puts it around his shoulders, wondering if she hasn’t overstepped her boundaries. She _did_ imagine doing this. She thinks her adoptive parents did it for her, but who even remembers clearly at this point?

(Real memories are, indeed, a mess.)

For a moment, he stays perfectly still, but then she lets out a small breath of relief as his head slowly, slowly touches her shoulder. His hair feels soft and it smells like very cheap shampoo, and she can feel the moment he at least dozes off, because his entire frame relaxes a tiny bit against her side.

It’s –

It’s _nice_ , she thinks.

Better than how she had imagined it’d feel for the images she used to conjure in her lab.

She looks out of the window. It’s still snowing – she doesn’t mind the cold right now, at least it’s a change from her usual, but she probably won’t complain that it _won’t_ be cold, where they’re going.

Even if, admittedly, she’s not feeling cold right now. Not at all.

She meets her father’s eyes in the rearview mirror, and she can see how his entire face takes on a way softer look the moment he sees the both of them reflected in it.

She’s not so blind to not see that her own eyes look exactly the same, and truth to be told –

Truth to be told, she’s entirely glad for it.

 

 

End.


End file.
